All posts by Brandy Smith

Voice technology is rapidly growing in adoption and the use cases are expanding beyond the home and migrating into the business world. Businesses are beginning to understand that the way that consumers interact, learn, and purchase products are evolving. Based on the major adoption of voice technology to date, the predictions are that 50% of all searches will be voice searches by 2020, according to comscore and 55% of households will have a Voice Assistant by 2022 according to VoiceBot.ai reports. Now is the time for businesses and brands to start exploring what the voice experience can do for their business. Just a few examples of the use cases for businesses are, leveraging it as a marketing tool to reach the 35+ million users of voice platforms, such as Amazon Alexa & Google Home, using it internally as a reporting and data analytics tool, or arming your sales force with a dynamic skill to present to customers.

The Ten Steps to Developing Custom Voice Experience™ Solutions

Regardless of your business size, or the use case for which you choose to leverage voice technology, the process is the same. VoiceXP created a 10 Step Process which they use to create custom, dynamic Voice Experiences™ for customers. During the creation process, the VoiceXP team works closely with the customer to outline the key components, voice benchmarks, and audience to create a Voice Experience™ that is tailored to fit their messaging and industry. Once the software is built, tested, and verified secure, our launch team will provide creative socialization techniques to ensure widespread adoption and impact. Once the Voice Experience is live, the journey doesn’t end there, the customers Voice Ambassador provides tangible, peripheral metrics to help the client constantly benchmark and improve their Voice Experience™ ROI. VoiceXP’s Software-as-a-Service approach to voice technology allows for the content and messaging to be updated as needed to stay fresh, timely, and aligned with the industry, giving customers the ability to have their messaging evolve with the competitive landscape.

Want to learn more about the VoiceXP process to develop Voice Experience™ Solutions? Complete the form to get instant access to the Ten Steps to Developing Voice Experience™ infographic.

VoiceXP Can Help Your Business Embark on the Voice Experience™ Technology Journey

VoiceXP is dedicated to helping businesses not just leverage the possibilities of voice, but become market leaders in their respective industry. VoiceXP creates custom Voice Experiences™ for the best brands in the world, learn how.

A new era of computing is upon us, one where advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence are creating an explosion of interest in understanding and creating natural language processing and conversational interfaces. Platforms such as Amazon and Google are building user experiences leveraging voice assistants such as Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. Currently, over 30 million consumers have voice assistants in their homes, creating the potential for conversation as the new mode of interaction with technology. Now the new challenge facing developers is how to build a user experience that’s modeled after a natural human conversation.

Perfecting the Voice Experience

The top platforms are in a race to perfect the voice experience. Amazon has offered a means for Alexa developers to monetize their skills on its app store. New skills, use cases, and functionality are added to platforms at an exuberant pace. For those who are interested in how to create the perfect voice experience, or just for those who want to understand what the evolution of voice means to the future of computing, there are 5 books that any voice enthusiast should read. These books outline the basic mechanics of conversation, introduce core principles to design by, and present readers with practical UI toolkits to start creating conversational experiences that engage, delight, and truly help users.

VoiceXP can Help Your Business Embark on the Voice Experience™ Technology Journey

VoiceXP is dedicated to helping businesses not just leverage the possibilities of voice, but become market leaders in their respective industry. VoiceXP creates custom Voice Experiences™ for the best brands in the world, learn how.

The Voice technology space is evolving at an exponential pace, and the untapped potential of marketing and connecting with customers like never before is about to explode. Amazon and Google are leading the way to provide simple and scalable platforms that customers can leverage in their homes and businesses via voice user interfaces like Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. VoiceXP is dedicated to helping businesses not just leverage the possibilities of Voice Experience™ , but become market leaders in their respective industry.

Presence on the Amazon Alexa platform is the first step in your commitment to participating in the Voice First Movement. If you have a website. Great! If you have a mobile app. Even better! What the biggest brands are missing out on today is the opportunity to have a presence on the hottest technology platform that serves over 30 million consumers across the world. In order to establish your organization, brand, or company as a leader in technological innovation, you can learn from the VoiceXP Amazon Alexa skill as the exemplary produced by one of Amazon’s partners and two of only thirty Alexa Champions in the world. And, it has been enhanced for the Amazon Echo Show to add more features and improve the user experience.

Amazon Alexa Skill of the Week

In an effort to help businesses stay up to date on the latest voice technology we started a weekly blog series to highlight applications and skills for businesses. In this weeks series, we are highlighting the VoiceXP skill.

The VoiceXP skill can not only tell you about VoiceXP but it also showcases the capabilities of the platform. Use this skill with either a voice-only device or see additional content with the Echo Show. The VoiceXP skill features dynamic content that gives users an in depth look into the VoiceXP platform and it’s available services, introduces users to the VoiceXP team, which includes 2 Amazon Alexa Champions, how to get started, and more.

Here are some commands to try:

Tell me about VoiceXP.
• What is VoiceXP’s mission?
• Tell me about the team.

• How do I get started?
• Who are some customers?
• Who’s VoiceXP’s ideal customer?

• How do I contact VoiceXP?
• Tell me a fact.

Want to Learn How VoiceXP Can Accelerate Your Business Into the Voice Technology Space?

VoiceXP Founder and Chief Innovation Officer, Bob Stolzberg, visited Jeff Bernthal at the Fox2 News station Saturday to discuss the voice technology disruption. The future is in voice technology, a phenomena that has caught many by surprise in how quickly it has been adopted by millions. Consumers are rushing to purchase Amazon Dots, Echo Shows, Google Assistants, and other voice platforms to add to their homes and businesses. Voice assistants were the number one back to school purchase this year.

Bob goes on to talk about how the VoiceXP team works with businesses of all sizes to build custom and dynamic software to create the complete Enterprise Voice Experience™ for the best brands in the world. Watch the episode to learn about the VoiceXP exclusive Black Friday and Cyber Monday campaigns, and how it is evolving the holiday marketing and shopping experience for businesses and consumers alike.

Want to Learn How VoiceXP Can Accelerate Your Business Into the Voice Technology Space?

*Those unable to join us in person are welcome to attend “virtually” by registering here. A recording of the video will be available after the event for those who need it. Just ask!

Watch the recording here

Why: Chingy has always prided himself in being someone who pushes the envelope, and with the release of his new single, “FYR,” he’s doing it with a first of its kind use of voice technology. Partnering with Voice XP, Chingy will start the process of distributing material in a way never before used in the music industry.

You will be able to:

Play Chingy’s new single and EP.

Get information and updates on his live tour.

Get personal biographical information about Chingy.

Play his latest video on voice devices that have that capability.

At the Thursday event Chingy will demonstrate this disruptive new way to distribute music. Through voice, he can connect with fans like never before. This is a technology with the potential to expand to cover an artist’s entire body of work. The user only has to ask!

VoiceXP, a pioneer in the world of Alexa “skills” and voice experience is the only company in the Midwest currently endorsed by Amazon as an expert in this field. Voice XP will have representatives on hand to answer questions about the “nuts and bolts.”

VoiceXP provides a complete voice experience to customers across verticals. The worlds largest brands trust VoiceXP to develop, deploy, host and manage voice solutions required to successfully engage their prospects, clients, employees, and communities using the hottest voice platforms like Amazon Alexa & Google Home. Customers are leveraging voice platforms to learn about products and services, as well as make purchases. VoiceXp is excited to be working with a platinum recording artist to create a voice marketing campaign.

Howard Bailey, Jr. better known by his stage name Chingy, is a platinum award-winning music artist and actor. Chingy grew up in St. Louis, Missouri and began rapping in his late teens. He toured as an opening act with Nelly in the summer of 2002 and then became a protégé of Ludacris, who signed him to his newly formed Disturbing Tha Peace(DTP) record label.

Chingy will be the first music artist in history to promote his new single on Amazon Alexa, and he hired VoiceXP to create and execute the Alexa Skill. The VoiceXP team is excited to work with Chingy and his team to help his brand harness the power of voice user interfaces to promote his music to his fans, and beyond. Stay tuned to the VoiceXP blog for the launch of Chingy’s historic campaign.

On August 31st VoiceXP organized a live Voice Experience Disruption at Venture Cafe, in St. Louis, Mo.

Voice technology is changing the way people do business, and its impact will only continue to grow. Analysts predict that 30% of web browsing will be screenless in 2020, and that voice technology will be a $10 Billion dollar business. The event cultivated great conversations between some of the brightest minds in voice, and there is a lot to discuss, as the use cases and market for voice technology grows.

Now head of Conversation Design Advocacy and Partnerships at Google, Nandini has created voice experiences for over 17 years in 60+ languages and 120+ countries. She is passionate about helping people find help and creating an ecosystem of creative technologists to unlock the future of truly enabling interfaces that honor the core, evolved power of human communication.

His companies have the mission of helping people become better interactive content creators. Based in Nashville, Tennessee, the company is the home of both The Alexa Conference (Jan 18-20) andVoiceFirst.FM, a media network for the new era of voice-first computing.

Bob is the Founder and Chief Innovation Officer of VoiceXP, a St. Louis based enterprise software as a service company. VoiceXP provides the worlds best brands and businesses with the complete enterprise Voice Experience.

This week we launched Office Hours, a live webinar series hosted by the VoiceXP team. The premise behind Office Hours is to share with our customers, both current and prospective, the new and exciting opportunities that Voice Experience™ technology has to offer.

In this episode, Karim, Doug, and Mark share the how retailers can take advantage of the VoiceXP Black Friday & Cyber Monday Promotion. This promotion allows enterprise businesses to market their custom holiday specials on the hottest engagement channel, Amazon Alexa & Google Assistant voice platforms.

In our Amazon Alexa Skill of the Week series, we generally highlight applications and skills for businesses. In this weeks series, we are highlighting a skill that was created to help benefit a great foundation which is raising awareness around an important social issue, teenage depression and anxiety.

Leverage the Power of Voice for a Great Cause

Drew Firment and Terren Peterson have both committed to donating $1 for each 0f the first 100 users that try the skill, and VoiceXP will match their commitment!

To learn more or to download the Speak Up Skill, visit the site here or it can be activated via the Alexa app, available for both Apple and Android. From there you can simply say “Alexa enable Speak Up” and make a positive impact for a great cause!

The uses for conversational user interface (UI) experiences are rapidly increasing. Thus creating a surge in demand for voice-forward products and services. As a result, Amazon extended Alexa to third-party device makers via the Alexa Voice Service (AVS). Alexa Voice Service provides the programming interfaces to easily add cloud-based intelligence and hands-free voice control to connected products. The AVS Device SDK further simplifies the experience of voice-enabling your product. By leveraging the SDK, developers can quickly create device software and get to market faster with Alexa-enabled products.

What is in the SDK?

The AVS Device SDK provides C++-based libraries which enable devices to process audio inputs and triggers, establish persistent connections with AVS, and handle all Alexa interactions. The SDK also includes the capability agents which leverage the AVS API to handle core Alexa functionality, including speech recognition and synthesis, and other capabilities such as streaming media, timers and alarms, notifications, weather reports, and thousands of custom skills.

Created for Commercial Device Makers

The Amazon Developer team has been working with more than 50 commercial device makers during their invite-only developer preview. The response to the SDK has been positive, as users state that it has allowed them to quickly integrate their product or software with Alexa, and drastically cutting down on development time. The SDK is now generally available to all developers and Alexa enthusiasts, with tutorials, documentation, and a sample app to get started.

You can get started by visiting the Amazon Developers site and checking out their Getting Started With the AVS Device SDK tutorial to learn about the SDK and the basics of getting it up and running. Get the AVS Device SDK from GitHub to build your prototype using the sample app for Raspberry Pi and set up your development environment. Visit the Amazon AVS Device SDK page on the developer portal to learn more about how you can Alexa-enabled products faster using the SDK.

When Amazonfirst introduced the Echo, it was a bit of a novelty, the latest and greatest tech toy. Rapidly the company has increased what Alexa, the artificial intelligence (AI) voice assistant that powers the Amazon family of voice devices, can do. One of the ways that Amazon has scaled the breadth of skills for Alexa was by creating a community of developers who were passionate about the voice space, and how they could contribute to the expansion and awareness of the growing use cases for Alexa. Amazon took it one step farther by creating Alexa Champions, a recognition program designed to honor the most engaged developers and contributors in the community.

At VoiceXP, we are lucky enough to have two Alexa Champions on staff, Bob Stolzberg and Mark Tucker. VoiceXP customers get the advantage of leveraging Bob & Mark’s knowledge around how voice technology is changing how users interact, learn, and do business, and what that means to their brand strategy. VoiceXP creates and delivers unique, branded experiences that enables our clients to interact with customers in new and disruptive ways. Our team has a diverse skill set to help our clients positively impact sales, marketing, technology, and talent development.

Meet the VoiceXP Alexa Champions

Bob Stolzberg, Founder/Chief Innovation Officer at VoiceXP

Bob is convinced voice technology will revolutionize the way we interact with information, and he says he has his kids to thank for that realization.

“The aha moment was watching how my kids interact with this technology,” Bob says. “It’s second nature to them. They’re going to be the generation that doesn’t have cell phones when they get older, because they’re going to have voice services.”

Bob has worked in a number of roles across the technology sector, from engineer to evangelist. He tells his clients voice technology is rapidly becoming the third pillar of marketing for businesses, joining websites and social media as a must-do for connecting with customers.

Bob hosts the Saint Louis Alexa Meetup group, and he encourages developers who are new to Alexa to seek out community. “You need to lurk on the Tuesday Office Hours call,” he says. Next steps: get to work—and don’t be afraid to share what you’ve built. “Put yourself out there and ask for feedback,” Bob says. “Don’t be afraid to develop skills and then share them with people.

“This technology will be everywhere,” Bob says. “It’s going to start by being in your home, in your kitchen. It’s going to be in your car, in your office. It’s going to be built into wearables. This technology has endless possibilities.”

Mark Tucker, Principal Engineer at VoiceXP

Mark is a full-stack developer who’s on a mission to help businesses reach millions of customers through devices with Alexa.

“Voice technology is on the cusp of revolutionizing the way people interact with information”, he says. “I see, in the future, a lot more of the everyday devices in your home having Alexa installed on them,” he says. “There are just going to be more and more voice-enabled devices.”

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VoiceXP is the industry leader in developing enterprise-level software as a service, which allows companies, organizations, and brands to create meaningful experiences using voice-first technology.SCHEDULE DEMO